What is your biggest need?

ArtWorks Board and staff are in the process of holding launch events and meetings with arts groups to figure out what unmet needs there are in the arts community in the Triangle. But we want to hear from everybody. So, tell us…. what do you see as the unmet needs? Affordable health care? Marketing assistance? Centralized job and grant listings? Are there more types of information that it would be helpful to have on the ArtWorks website? Are there classes that would be helpful? Socials?

Is there something you have always been thinking “If someone would just……”

We are looking for long term ideas, short term ideas….everything. The Board will take these ideas and prepare a short and long term strategic plan.

13 Comments

Affordable health care. All of the suggestions you made would be helpful actually, but most of these things I can figure out on my own. Health care bills are staggering for us. We need a fix soon. The problem is that I really don’t understand how the health insurance company works. I have kept my same policy instead of shopping around for others because I am afraid if I change policies that I will lose out in some way. There is so much fine print and there are so many ways the companies can screw you over without you even knowing. I am happy to buy my own insurance but the cost of our family’s insurance in proportion to our income is crazy. I wonder if a group of artists can go in together and get a better deal. I really don’t know how it works.

Free studio space. There is an abundance of available commercial space. I think spaces would be more attractive to potential real estate clients if they were being used being used. The renovated (and vacant) car repair shop on the corner of Boylan and Hillsborough is a prime example. That space, with it’s large windows, would be more desirable if lit and inhabited and art was visible from the street.

I think the thing artists do least well is connect with the business community. The business community has a fundamental and deep need for artists of quality to live and work in their area, yet the best artists often have little or no way of connecting to that community. I would LOVE to see a system established that would create relationships between artists and business men and women in our area. Not for the business people to teach the artists how to become better business people (though that would help), but for them to get to know each other and for the business people to learn how they can best serve their city by serving the needs of the city’s best and brightest.

To pursue the mission of Triangle ArtWork’s name. Let’s create a go-to place (physical and web-based) for information about arts in the triangle. Let’s connect Raleigh’s, Durham’s, Pittsboro’s, Carrboro’s, Apex’s, CH’s art communities. So that we cultivate cross-dialogue, support of intra-Triangle events and initiatives, and provide consolidated information for Triangle-based artists, curators, critics, students, and audience members regardless of which county or city they live in or what artistic medium(s) they work in or enjoy viewing. Not to alter the many great region-specific list-servs and opportunities currently available, but to locate them within a larger nexus of information.
Individual people are absolutely doing this already via their participation and support of triangle events and lectures and exhibitions, but a larger support structure needs to be in place.
Good examples of this are NYFA: New York Foundation For the Arts, LMCC: Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, City of Las Vegas Arts Commission, among many others.

Make the gap between zipcodes smaller. I’d love to see less of a disconnect between Raleigh, Chapel Hill, Durham, Cary, etc. If there were some social event/art show/display that could bring the world of art together, that’d be just awesome. Thanks!

We need reliable, and more flexible, weekly rehearsal space for our burgeoning youth music ensemble program. Ideally that would be our “own” space in a central Raleigh location, in which we could program to fit our needs rather than be constrained by someone else’s schedule.

Shelleysays:

August 29, 2010 at 10:59 am

I’d be interested to learn about a reverse question posed back at Triangle ArtWorks: what are your members’ current strengths and experiences?

For example, if there’s a need for health insurance in the artist community, but your thought leaders and volunteers have no experience in this area, is it a good area for you to expand? If you see a need for a larger Web-based community, do you have the technical expertise to make good decisions about developing it?

It’s good to see people play to their strengths, and it looks like you have an experienced board of directors. What strengths can they offer the community?

adminsays:

August 29, 2010 at 11:59 am

We agree that we have an awesome Board of Directors, and will certainly be looking to them for quidance in strategic planning and beyond. But to respond to Shelley’s question, ArtWorks strategic plan is being developed based on feedback from the Triangle arts and creative community, based on needs. Like similar regional arts service organizations around the country, ArtWorks will draw upon the expertise of other organizations and people in the Triangle, as well as the expertise and services of national arts organizations, to develop services and programs. If you want to talk more about how ArtWorks will get its work done, we would be glad to talk to you. Just email us at info@triangleartworks.org.

As a performing musician, I think we need AUDIENCES and good places to play! It would be great if we could break down some of the usual barriers and change some of the usual expectations with regards to performance. For instance, if we could bring together interested restaurant, pub and other business owners with performing artists to create exciting new venues.